Great Power Reclamation

Within the city of Rising Sun, the piercing air raid sirens have become a daily background noise.

Premier Yang Dawei's command center, like a high-speed precision instrument, allocates the last drop of domestic resources and calculates the slightest fluctuations in the international situation with almost ruthless efficiency.

He provided crucial, albeit small, support to the front lines. His composure was a reassurance to those at home.

Ye Mei and Ye Rou, on the other hand, became the belief itself.

In the broadcasting room where the sound of gunfire could be faintly heard, Ye Mei's voice remained steady.

She did not hide the severity of the situation at the front; instead, she described the bravery and sacrifice of the soldiers in a more candid tone, and read aloud more letters from ordinary families and snippets of information sent back from the front.

She launched the "Sleep with the Frontline" campaign, calling on the public to turn off their lights and remain silent at designated times, praying in their hearts for the soldiers on the front lines.

As night falls, Sunrise City and its surrounding towns are plunged into an organized darkness and silence, with only the flickering candlelight in the windows of every house (symbolizing prayers for the front lines), like stars on the earth, silently confronting the flashes of gunfire in the night sky.

This nationwide sense of ritual integrates individual fears into collective resilience.

Ye Rou then did something even more astonishing and dangerous.

With extremely tight security and the support of Yang San's elite squad, she managed to cross some relatively safe transportation routes and appear at a large forward logistics hub, which was also a transfer center for seriously wounded soldiers, less than 50 kilometers from the main battlefield.

When she appeared at the transit station, which reeked of gunpowder, disinfectant, and blood, covered in dust but with a burning gaze, everyone was stunned.

She wasn't wearing fancy clothes, just a simple combat jacket, and her hair was simply tied up.

She visited every wounded soldier who could speak, held their bandaged or even mutilated hands, listened to their combat experiences, and personally distributed gifts sent by people from their hometowns to some of the lightly wounded.

In the open space of the transfer station, she spoke to a group of soldiers who had just been withdrawn to rest, their faces filled with exhaustion and sorrow, with the distant roar of the front lines faintly visible behind them.

“I’ve come not to tell you not to be afraid, because I know you are already the bravest people.”

Her voice trembled slightly with emotion, yet remained crystal clear: "I've come to stand with you and see what we're protecting together! Look at these wounded brothers, why are they bleeding? Look at this land behind us, why is it worth risking our lives for?"

She pointed to the distant sky, which was bathed in red light: "The enemy is there, with their masters' planes and cannons, trying to take everything from us! Do they think they can subdue us with these things?"

"They are wrong! They destroyed our houses, but we can rebuild them! They took our lives, but our spirit will be carried on by our brothers and sisters! But as long as one person stands in East Africa, as long as the flag of East Africa flies, as long as you still have guns in your hands and fire in your hearts, we will never surrender!"

"Today, I, Ye Rou, here swear an oath in the honor of the Ye family and in the name of the Queen of East Africa:"

"I am with you! My sister is with you! The Prime Minister is with you! All the people of East Africa are with you! We may perish, but East Africa will never perish! Blood debts must be repaid in blood! Victory will ultimately belong to those who defend their homeland!"

There was no television broadcast, but these words spread like wildfire across the front lines through word of mouth among soldiers and battlefield communications.

The Queen's personal presence in the perilous situation, sharing the same breath and fate with the soldiers, had a spiritual impact that no speech delivered from the rear could match.

"The Queen is with us!"

It became the shortest yet most powerful mobilization order. Many exhausted troops once again displayed astonishing fighting power.

They were not fighting for an abstract nation, but for the tangible leaders and homeland behind them, leaders who were willing to die with them.

The most intense wave of the "Thunderbolt" offensive crashed against the dike built by the flesh and blood and will of the East African military and civilians for three days and three nights, and its momentum finally began to show signs of fatigue.

The coalition forces also paid a heavy price. More importantly, they discovered that they were not facing a regime on the verge of collapse, but a war monster that was being forged stronger in the fires of war, every cell of which was filled with hatred and obsession.

Yang San, during those three hellish days, never left his forward command post.

He seized the moment when the Allied offensive was faltering and a slight gap appeared in the coordination between the various units, and once again wielded the "fire hammer".

This time, the target was not a large troop group, but several key logistical nodes and suspected external technical support camps deep within the coalition's territory.

A suicide squad, composed of remnants of the "Desert Scorpions" and the most fearless armored infantry, slipped into the enemy's ranks like a venomous snake under the cover of night and electronic deception.

With astonishing speed and a desperate spirit, they destroyed three fuel depots and an ammunition storage point in succession, and raided a camp that was relatively poorly guarded but equipped with large antennas and signal jamming equipment.

The battle was brief and brutal, and the suicide squad was almost completely wiped out, but the footage they brought back and some of the captured equipment wreckage had strategic value.

Evidence shows that external technical forces were indeed directly involved in electronic warfare and intelligence support against the E Federation.

Taking this opportunity, Yang Da launched an even fiercer diplomatic, legal, and public opinion counterattack from the rear.

Meanwhile, the Allied forces at the front lines have seen their offensive falter significantly after losing some key logistical and "stealth" support.

After paying an almost unbearable price, the scales of war finally tipped decisively and slightly.

East Africa was not defeated; its bones grew stronger with each crack, and its eyes burned with an even more terrifying light after the bloodshed.

Yang San stood at the observation post, blackened by gunpowder smoke, watching the artillery fire gradually thinning in the distance.

He knew that the most dangerous phase might have temporarily passed, but it was far from over. The enemy would lick their wounds and brew an even more insidious counterattack.

He turned around and said to the chief of staff who was standing silently behind him:

"Count the number of personnel still capable of fighting, replenish ammunition, and reinforce fortifications. Tell the children..."

His voice lowered, “We…held the first round. But don’t let your guard down. Tell everyone, including myself—as long as there’s one enemy on our soil, the war is far from over.”

"We must make them bleed to death and be terrified, so that they and their masters will never again dare to cast even the slightest greedy glance at East Africa."

In the utterly exhausted command post, no one answered; only heavy breathing and a cold, stubborn flame in his eyes, identical to that in the Commander-in-Chief's.

The royal flag still flies over Sunrise City, and it flies in the hearts of every soldier and civilian in East Africa.

It was stained with the grime of gunfire, yet it appeared all the more solemn and sacred. Because this flag was raised by countless ordinary yet extraordinary lives, through their present efforts, towards tomorrow.

Just as the soldiers on the East African front were using their flesh and blood to withstand the "Thunder" general offensive, the rear was struggling to operate under Yang Da's command, and Ye Mei and Ye Rou were using their own bodies as torches to unite the people.

Another force, like a giant whale quietly adjusting its course in the deep sea, is beginning to reveal its true nature.

The international media were the first to feel this force. Several mainstream Western media outlets with deep-rooted connections that had long dominated negative reporting on East Africa were suddenly subjected to precise attacks from multiple directions.

First, a well-known journalist under its umbrella was exposed for accepting huge "consulting fees" from a lobbying group linked to the financial backers of the coalition forces.

Following this, their exclusive photos of the "humanitarian crisis" in East Africa were analyzed frame by frame by a top-notch technical team, who pointed out that many scenes were contradictory, suspected to be staged, or taken from other conflict zones.

Almost simultaneously, several smaller but influential independent media outlets and think tanks known for their investigative reporting began publishing a series of in-depth reports:

The document details the intricate resource and interest chains behind the coalition forces and the "indirect intervention" of certain major powers through arms companies and private military contractors.

And a wealth of positive images and data on how East Africa maintained basic order in resettlement camps and organized refugees to produce and help themselves under extremely difficult circumstances.

These reports, based on solid evidence and with clear logic, quickly gained traction on the internet and in the public discourse of some non-Western countries, creating a powerful counterbalancing effect.

This is no coincidence. Several top public relations and law firms in Brussels, New York, and London received huge commissions almost simultaneously from a “Global Cultural Exchange Foundation” registered in the Cayman Islands.

They were asked to "ensure balanced and impartial information about the conflict in the East African Federation".

The main donors of this foundation, if traced back, have a subtle connection with certain industrial trusts that the Ye family established overseas in its early years and which have now flourished.

Following this, undercurrents surged in the financial sector. Several hedge funds and multinational banks that were shorting East African bonds or facilitating financing for the coalition forces were subjected to unexplained technical attacks.

Their trading systems experienced brief anomalies, and key decision-making models faced challenges from complex algorithms. Several letters of credit involving sensitive goods were even suspended by long-established European private banks on the grounds of "compliance review anomalies."

Although the final losses were not significant, they were enough to send chills down the spines of these financial vultures, making them realize that behind East Africa stood a seemingly fearless and capable adversary who could maneuver against them in the gray area.

However, what truly unsettled certain "masters" behind the coalition were the "accidents" that occurred in the fields of technology and supplies.

Yang San received a top-secret list at the command post, with the source indicated by only a simple symbol:

A golden poplar leaf. The manifest lists the name of the goods, the estimated delivery time and coordinates, but not the shipper.

At first, he was skeptical. But when the appointed time came, the frontline scouts actually found the first batch of "goods" on the list in an underground warehouse at an abandoned border trading post.

These were not standard-issue weapons, but rather high-performance field communication jammer components, precision sniper rifle sights, and a batch of individual drone jamming guns that were in extremely short supply for the East African army.

After inspection, the technical officers were shocked to discover that some of the core modules of these devices, in terms of design style and manufacturing characteristics, were highly similar to the experimental equipment of the latest equipment of a certain major northern country, but had been cleverly anonymized.

Immediately following was a supply operation that the frontline soldiers called "black rain".

On several nights, in some remote areas behind the coalition lines, large, unmarked swarms of drones (whose quietness and endurance far exceeded those of common models) quietly swept by, dropping reinforced containers.

Inside were specially packaged individual rations suitable for tropical battlefields, antibiotics, blood plasma, and... advanced anti-tank missiles and man-portable air defense systems with original factory markings in different languages, but all traceable information had been laser-etched away.

The package includes a very detailed multilingual user manual and a simple repair guide.

The arrival of this equipment could not change the overall battle situation, but it was like injecting several high-energy stimulants into a body that had lost too much blood.

Yang San's most elite "Fire Hammer" troops and special forces used this equipment to launch several extremely tricky short assaults.

Specifically targeting the advanced drone command vehicles, electronic reconnaissance units, and logistical nodes recently deployed by the coalition forces, the operation achieved results far exceeding expectations, further disrupting the coalition's offensive rhythm.

The coalition command and its backers were furious. They were convinced that there was substantial external interference, but they couldn't find any evidence to support it.

The origin of the goods is a mystery, the transportation route is untraceable, and all technical characteristics point to the "black market" and "third parties".

However, a supply of "black market" of this scale and quality is clearly not something that ordinary arms dealers can handle.

They began frantically investigating internal vulnerabilities and strengthening counter-espionage and counter-infiltration efforts, creating an atmosphere of suspicion and tension.

During her inspection of the Northern Development Zone, Ye Rou "encountered" a strange "international non-governmental technical assistance team".

The team leader was a middle-aged Chinese engineer with a warm smile who introduced himself as "Lin". He held multiple passports and had a clean background, like a blank sheet of paper.

They claimed to be commissioned by an "Agricultural Development Foundation" of a neutral country to help East Africa optimize its wartime agricultural production system.

However, Ye Rou noticed that this "forest worker" and his team members were very knowledgeable about topics such as automated irrigation, drone plant protection, and extracting natural pesticides from local plants, and their knowledge depth far exceeded that of ordinary agricultural experts.

During a private conversation, "Lin Gong" casually mentioned a paper published by Ye Rou's father, Ye Wancheng, in the early years of the "Military Reclamation Pharmaceutical Research Newsletter" about using special strains of bacteria to improve Gobi soil, and casually mentioned a few key data.

Ye Rou understood. She didn't point it out, but simply smiled and welcomed them, offering them the greatest possible convenience in their work.

Soon, the "aid team" not only helped the development zone improve crop disease resistance and yield, but also "incidentally" improved the water purification system and garbage disposal process of several major resettlement camps, greatly reducing the risk of disease.

More importantly, they established a covert and efficient data collection network capable of monitoring suspicious electromagnetic signals and personnel movements in border areas in real time.

This information, after being encrypted, flowed continuously into Yang Da and Yang San's command system. They were like the most skilled "gardeners," helping crops grow while also quietly laying out a monitoring network to defend against pests.

Meanwhile, in the areas where the fighting is most intense on the front lines, there are occasionally some ambiguous "battlefield observers" or "independent journalists".

They always appear in the most critical or dangerous areas, are agile, well-equipped, and have an almost intuitive understanding of the battlefield situation.

They never directly participate in the fighting, but they always manage to "coincidentally" discover clues before the coalition launches a surprise attack, or "accidentally" provide key firing point coordinates or evacuation route suggestions when the East African squad is in dire straits.

One of the seriously wounded E Federation soldiers who was dragged back from the shelling recalled that the man who rescued him had a small tattoo on his arm that looked like some kind of fern.

These people, like ghostly surgeons, perform precise interventions at the most minute levels, healing wounds and strengthening resistance.

Deep beneath the Qingliang Palace in Xuri City, in a secret chamber with the highest level of electromagnetic shielding, a cross-ocean encrypted video conference was taking place on a large screen in front of Ye Mei and Ye Rou.

On the other side of the screen were several figures in different time zones, their faces blurred.

One of the voices, though aged, carried an undeniable strength and spoke in slightly accented Mandarin:

"...Public opinion has begun to shift, but it's not enough. We need more impactful events to solidify the evidence of their 'proxy war' and 'war crimes.' Have they received the 'gift'?"

Ye Mei calmly replied, "Received it, the effect is remarkable. Thank you."

Another, relatively new voice interface speaks very quickly, with the precision of a technician:

"The next batch of 'deliveries' will include jamming schemes and hardware prototypes targeting their new data links. In addition, we have released several 'modified' virus packages on the dark web, targeting their logistics management software and certain communication terminals, which are expected to take effect within 72 hours, creating chaos."

Ye Rou's eyes sharpened: "A direct cyberattack? Won't it leave traces?"

The young voice chuckled: "Don't worry, it's the 'natural spread' version. The source will point to one of their own careless contractors. We're providing a 'flawed toolbox,' and it's their own 'misuse' that's to blame."

The aged voice rang out again: "Yang San is under a lot of pressure, but he held on. You all did a great job on the front lines, especially Ye Rou's trip to the front lines, which was worth as much as a division."

The old men in the family were very pleased, saying that the Ye family's daughter hadn't disgraced them. But remember, our role is that of a 'shadow,' a 'lever,' not your own backbone. Ultimately, victory must be won by the land and people of East Africa themselves.”

Ye Mei nodded solemnly: "We understand. East Africa will not fall."

"Very good." The aged voice said finally, "Go ahead and do it. The sky won't fall down, and even if it does, there are tall people to hold it up first. The Ye family has never been a bystander."

Communication ends.

The two sisters exchanged a glance and saw the heavy pressure in each other's eyes, and beneath that pressure, an even more determined light.

They are not fighting alone. A vast and secretive network is operating for them, providing comprehensive support from public opinion to technology.

This is not simply family aid, but the power demonstrated by a community with intertwined interests and beliefs at a critical moment.

Ye Rou clenched her fists: "Sister, we can't let our family down, and we can't let the blood of the soldiers on the front lines be shed in vain."

Ye Mei looked at the East Africa map hanging on the wall of the secret room. Her gaze seemed to penetrate the reinforced concrete and see the smoke of gunpowder on the front line and the resolute faces of the soldiers.

“Of course,” she said softly but firmly. “Pass on the order to Commander-in-Chief Yang San and Premier Yang:”

"The Ye family's 'gardeners' and 'surgeons' are in place. Tell them to give full command and fight with all their might. The international noise, the domestic supplies, and the trouble caused by the enemy's 'advanced toys'... there are people who will handle those matters."

"We must win, and we must win cleanly, so that all those who covet this land will never dare to look it in the eye again!"

The form of war has quietly escalated in dimensions that the world has not yet fully perceived.

On the front is the Great Wall built by the people and soldiers of East Africa with their blood and iron, while in the shadows is the invisible net woven by the Ye family and their associated forces with capital, technology and influence.

The flames of war in East Africa are not only burning in Red Rock Valley and outside Sunrise City, but also in the financial markets, the undercurrents of the Internet, and every silent corner of international diplomacy.

Wolves surrounded them, but the alliance between hunter and guardian was already in place. (End of Chapter)